Co. Kildare

The next few posts will be brief so that hopefully I can catch up with them.

Co. Kildare
After my unexpected detour through Limerick I finally arrived in Clane, the town where Derek's mum (Sheila) lives, at about 5 o'clock on Saturday evening. I met up with Derek, Sarah, and Derek's family. We headed straight out to the hotel across the road where a lot of Derek's friends had met up for a few drinks. I met a lot of people and can't remember most their names but they were all a good laugh, we had a really great night. The next day we had a bit of a lie-in and then Sheila & Derek cooked a really nice Irish breakfast... The weather was amazing, blue skies and really hot - we were thinking of going to do some sight seeing in the mountains but by the time we had surfaced and had breakfast it was nearly 3pm so we decided to give that a miss. Instead we went out for a birthday BBQ for Derek's friend Liz. We had another really fun evening, I met a few new faces and quite a few of the people from the night before. Derek took his mandolin and guitar and I took my fiddle and we had a bit of a music session. After the BBQ we headed back to the bar where Derek's mum and her sister were, and once the live music finished we went back to Sheila's for some more music which went on pretty much until sunrise.

A very blurred picture of Sarah, Derek, Staffy, & Gillian (Derek's sister)

Staffy (i think) showing me his impression of a 'knacker' (kind of the Irish equivilent of a chav) - he got a bit carried away with this role and eventually was asked to leave the bar!


Liz's BBQ

Derek
Waiting for a taxi - Derek, Conor (i think), & me
Sheila & TerrySheila's sister & partner (Veronica... or Val - something beginning with V & John - maybe!)

Liz & Patrick

A big thank you to Derek & Sarah for letting me hijack your holiday, and thanks to Sheila for putting me up for the weekend!

Glendalough
On the Monday I headed of to a valley in the Mountains called Glendalough. Glendalough is a really tranquil spot in the Wicklow mountains with a couple of lakes (the name literally means valley (glen) of 2 (da) lakes (lough)... I think). With the sun shining it was perfect - except for the fact that it was a bank holiday Monday and the entire population of the east coast of Ireland had decided that it would be a nice place to go for the day... this is the only place so far on my trip that I have actually been stuck in a traffic jam! - I drove just a few km from Glendalough and found a secluded little area to park up for the night - I went for a little walk into the valley and played some music before going to bed to try and catch up with some sleep.